You’re going to be hearing quite a bit about German wine here on the virtual pages of 1WineDude this month. This is due primarily to the fact that German wines totally rock right now, but is influenced primarily by the Twitter Taste Live events that are focusing on German Riesling during the month of October.

The TTL / German Wine blitzkreig kicks into gear in earnest tonight with a blogger tasting event featuring the fantastic wines of Mosel producer Raimund Prum. I had the pleasure of hanging out with Raimond at the S.A. Prum estate earlier this year, where “Der Specht” entertained us with his tireless promotion of all things Mosel-wine-related, grilled beef for dinner on the estate lawn, and poured copious amounts of his wines without providing a spit bucket. My kind of wine producer!

What I want to tell you about today is the email newsletter that I received from the Deutsches Weininstitut. And you’re gonna want to pay attention, because sexy ladies are involved.

No, I’m serious…

I’m not sure exactly how I got on the Deutsches Weininstitut email newsletter distro. list. TO be perfectly frank, I don’t normally read their newsletters; not because I don’t love German wines (I do – in fact, I love Mosel Riesling almost as much as I love my daughter and probably more than I love my dog), but because the newsletter is in German, so I only understand about 6 of the words in any given DW email.

The latest newsletter, however, caught my eye because it contained a photo of 12 hot German babes holding glasses of German wine. What can I say – some messages simply transcend the barriers of language and culture. It seems that the election process has kicked off for the eventual crowning of the German Wine Queen, whose finals begin on October 9.

I know what you’re thinking.

Germany has a Wine Queen? How did I not know this? And why the hell don’t we have this for wine regions in the U.S.?!??

Great questions. Personally, I think we’re missing a major marketing opportunity here.

Anyway, her majesty will be picked from representatives from the 13 German Anbaugebieten (wine regions) – currently, there are only 12 women in the running as the representative of the Middle Rhine has extended its term by one year and therefore will take until 2010. Among the Queen’s royal duties is presiding over various events meant to promote the understanding and enjoyment of Germany’s wines. It’s not just a beauty contest, however – the candidates need to know details about the country’s wines so that they can act as an ambassador for German wine when they travel to wine events in other countries.

I really dig this concept, mostly because I love the idea of hot girls who are into wine (hey, at least I’m honest about it!). But it does make me wonder… what would it be like to have a Miss Cuvee Washington State or Lady of the Finger Lakes promoting their wine regions…?

Anyway, for more on the candidates vying for the royal German title, see deutscheweinkoenigin.de . I’ve got my personal fave for whom I’m routing to be crowned Queen, but in the interest of fairness I’ll just keep that to myself.

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Comments

It's an unbelievable idea, but I just don't know if it would work in the states. As Dennis Reynold's Balki Bartokomous-like roommate Jan said in "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia", season 4, episode 6 ("Mac and Charlie Die Part 2"): "you Americans are so uptight!"

Sure, there are "Miss Americas" and "Miss Hawaiian Tropics", but I think the intellectual aura of wine would cause this effort to be eschewed by the stuffy stuffingtons (these are technical terms) who perhaps still dominate the industry. That being said, I'm down. We don't have any AVA's in Georgia (yet), but I will gladly start looking for "Miss Dahlonega Plateau"

Are you aware that both DWI and CMA (German Agricultural Marketing Board) have both been blindsided by a recent German Supreme Court ruling that the way they've been funded (automatic contributions like a "checkoff" program in the U.s. Beef, pork and cotton industries) is not legal. So with the funding cut off, both orgs. need to reinvent themselves. I spoke to Arnim von Friedeburg, MD of CMA (and a former client of mine) and he confirmed this. They're taking CMA private and will continue its work, but it looks like the same thing is happening with DWI which is represented by R.F. Binder in the US. What have you heard?

I got the chance to meet the 2007-2008 German Wine Queen during a tour of Rheinhessen/Pfalz/Rheingau, and she was quite the ambassador. The role is taken extremely seriously and actually seemed to be effective at raising awareness of German wines in the EU, and in Germany between different wine regions.

In Mendoza, Argentina they have something similar called the Fiesta Nacional de la Vendimia, which is basically a beauty pageant, and it's a BIG deal. I attended a few years back and was amazed at the size of the spectacle. It's held in a huge ampitheater and tens of thousands of people attend.
Here's a You Tube clip that gives a good overview:

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[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Andrea Schmitz and Chris Gillis. Chris Gillis said: great post from @1winedude on TasteLive this month http://bit.ly/1V5pn0 "The Queen is NOT Dead (German Hotties Vie for Wine Queen Title)" […]

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